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Expanding the heritage status of a downtown Gatineau neighbourhood would restrict condo development that would bring jobs, new homes and tax revenues, says a business group backing downtown development.

Gatineau has proposed heritage status for the entire Museum District, a neighbourhood of narrow streets and old houses just north of Place du Portage and Gatineau City Hall. Many of the old homes are now restaurants or law offices.

The district has about 50 buildings, including the Collège Saint-Joseph et the former presbytery of Notre-Dame-de-Grâce Church. Many date from soon after the Great Fire of 1900.

Now an “economic analysis” commissioned by a business group called Essor centre-ville (Downtown progress), says a plan to extend heritage status to the whole district would be “harmful” to the city.

The Gatineau Chamber of Commerce is against the heritage status, while Protégeons le Quartier du Musée and the Société d’histoire de l’Outaouais are for it.

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This sets up an election debate.

The current mayor, Maxime Pedneaud-Jobin, wants heritage status for the whole Museum District. He has said he isn’t against development — as long as it goes somewhere else.

The analysis released Friday argues:

• One-third of the buildings in this neighbourhood have no heritage value, but they would be trapped by the overall neighbourhood designation limiting how how they could be redeveloped.

• Renovating a property with a heritage designation costs 50 to 350 per cent more than ordinary renovations, it says.

• And it says the city is missing out on $7.2 million a year in taxes that it could have with redevelopment.

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The analysis says various developers want to move ahead with three projects, including Brigil’s Place du Peuple condo towers on Laurier Street, one of 55 stories and the other 35 stories. As well, the Four Points Sheraton wants to expand, and the Dormani Group wants to build a project called the Champlain Tower.

Together these projects would add 905 homes, 465 hotel rooms, and more than 12,000 square metres of commercial space, the report says. They would bring $520 million in investment and create homes for 1,500 residents, with a continuing spinoff effect for the local economy from money the new residents spend.

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The report also also forecasts nearly 4,000 new jobs as the projects are built.

Essor centre-ville is asking the city to evaluate properties individually instead of having a blanket designation for the district.

The group has the backing of Pierre Samson, an independent candidate running in that district (Hull-Wright).

Mayoral challenger Clément Bélanger jumped in Friday with support for the anti-heritage movement.

The city wants to have more people living in the downtown area, he said, and “a broad heritage designation of the Museum District would put the brakes on its revitalization.”

He calls the jobs and increased tax revenues “essential for our local economic development.”

Two other mayoral challengers, both former councillors, have long been opponents of the heritage designation.

Denis Tassé and Sylvie Goneau have both argued that “sensible” development in the quarter is vital to Gatineau’s long-term economic viability.

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